Nevada County picayune., 1887-04-20

say this lnow l cannot explain what induced me to say the following foolish, braggish, speech, but it bubbled up and was spoken):
 "Colonel, you or l may die be. fore night; we do not know; but, in so far as the result of your courts finding is concerned, l shall be alive when you and your twelve officers are dead and forgottenl'
 He left me in disgust, and l don't blame him.
 But such was my feeling. l did not "feel it in my bones." as the slang goes, that death was so near.
 The Colonel and the entire . twelve composing the court died before was eXchanged-"shot to death" in one charge at "COal Har- bor." I live to write the occur renee twenty-five years after the conversation.
 It may or may not be true that when the grim monster singles out his victim he sends him in some way a spiritual premonitlon that he ! is going to let fly from death's culver the fatal dart Be that as it may, had no premonition of death.
 Not when they stood me up to hear my sentence and to answer, nor afterwards in the cool cOntem. plation my isolation and silent dun geOn afforded; not when the of ticers of the day, on the eventful execution morning, read to me in my dungeon the days programme. and delineated my doom at the hands of twelve detailed soldiers. He found me whistling as paced my narrow cell that morning and exclaimed in surprise:
 "Good God, Captain, what kind of man are yonW
 "Oh, don't know, skin and , bone; flesh and sinews; blood and , bile. Why"
 "Why! Don't you know you are . to be shot to-day! Outside here are twelve men detailed to send you into eternity. You'll never see another morning! And you are whistling!
 "Well, why not whistle as long as possible and cry when you can :. not laugh?"
 Hence I may not be able to tell l just how one feels who stares , death calmly in the face! For may . be I did not comprehend my situa' ti0n.
 But I Was sentenced to death; <: that I fully comprehended when , they marched me, hand.cuffed, be- tween two guards with arms at , 'charge" and bayonets fixed, back , to the prison; and instead of my f former 12X12 cell, barred and f bolted me in an underground, dark. , damp dungeon, 3x 10, with a tub , occupying two feet of that sparse , space, significantly suggestive that was to stay right there until the { day and hour.
 F The sentence was fully realized , during the sunless days and no darker nights of the weeks that . followed.
 The post chaplain's was the only voice that l heard for weeks; and , his only once, for my levity shock ed him so that he gave me up as 3 an irredeemable reprobate. He of, fered prayer for me, however, l n courteously kneelins with him on ) the same stone floor. But he never { came again.
 g He told me--wbat my occasion { ally allowed letters from my friends f had too plainly informed me-that !. there was no hope of escape from !. the fate that seemed to them and n the outside world to be staring me in the face. Every possible effort V had been made, every available i. influence pressed into service with
 the president, and he had positive n ly declined to interfere with the e judgment of the court-martial
 The worthy chaplain corroborated t their sad information. Said he;
 "Captain. you shoull prepare
 for death, for your life ends in g ', few days"
 Finally it came. Shall I ever for
 get that November morning ir
 lS639
 They had told me that l should II be taken out at 9 o'clock in tho o mornino would be allowed an of